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| Editorial Zig-Zag | |
|---|---|
| Name | Editorial Zig-Zag |
| Type | Writing and editing technique |
| Scope | Media, Publishing, Journalism |
| Introduced | 20th century (approx.) |
| Notable examples | The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian |
Editorial Zig-Zag
Editorial Zig-Zag is a compositional and editorial technique used in periodicals, newspapers, and publishing to alternate perspectives, tones, and emphases within a single piece or across a series. It arose from practices in editorial boards, newsroom workflows, and publishing houses seeking to balance partisan, commercial, and readership demands. Practitioners have included editors at The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Le Monde, and Der Spiegel.
The term denotes an alternation strategy akin to editorial rotation found in New York Times Magazine, Time (magazine), Newsweek, The Economist, Reader's Digest where copy shifts between investigative, interpretive, and opinionated modes. Early antecedents appear in the production methods of Harper's Magazine, The Atlantic, Punch (magazine), and the editorial practices of William Randolph Hearst, Joseph Pulitzer, Adolph Ochs, and Rupert Murdoch. Influences include newsroom models at The Wall Street Journal, practices codified at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and editorial traditions at BBC News, Reuters, Agence France-Presse, and Associated Press.
Editorial alternation evolved alongside developments at Gutenberg press, Rotary press, Linotype, and the rise of mass-circulation papers like The Daily Telegraph and The Sun (United Kingdom). The technique matured through epochs influenced by events such as the First World War, Great Depression, Second World War, and the Cold War, when outlets like Pravda, Izvestia, The Times (London), and The Chicago Tribune experimented with mixed tonal strategies. Postwar shifts at Life (magazine), editorial experiments at Esquire, and the influence of columnists like William F. Buckley Jr., Walter Lippmann, Herbert L. Matthews, and Margaret Sullivan helped codify alternation norms. The digital era, marked by platforms like The Huffington Post, BuzzFeed, Vox (website), Medium (platform), and Substack, has accelerated Zig-Zag deployment across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube channels managed by outlets such as CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, Al Jazeera, and NPR.
Tactical implementations mirror editorial devices used by editors at Punch (magazine), The New Yorker, Guardian Weekly, and Financial Times. Techniques include alternating byline rotation practiced at Bloomberg L.P., alternating lead paragraphs seen in investigative series from ProPublica, juxtaposition editing used in features from Vanity Fair, and mixed-form journalism modeled by The Paris Review and Granta. Examples include multi-author projects at The New York Review of Books, serialized pieces in The Atlantic Monthly, and thematic alternation in Smithsonian Magazine. Newsroom training at Columbia Journalism Review, Poynter Institute, Knight Foundation, and editorial standards from Society of Professional Journalists codify such techniques.
Publishers implement alternation across book series from Penguin Books, Random House, Simon & Schuster, and HarperCollins, and in periodicals like National Geographic, Scientific American, Nature (journal), and Science (journal). Marketing and positioning at firms such as Condé Nast, Hearst Communications, Gannett, and Tronc deploy Zig-Zag-like editorial calendars. Public broadcasting entities like BBC World Service, CBC/Radio-Canada, and ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) apply alternation to programming; streamers like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Video reflect similar editorial scheduling in documentary slates.
Critics from think tanks like Cato Institute, Brennan Center for Justice, and commentators from The Spectator, The New Republic, Slate, and Jacobin argue alternation can mask bias or create false balance, a concern debated during coverage of events such as the Iraq War, Climate change, and elections in United States presidential election, 2004, Brexit referendum, 2016 United States presidential election. Legal and ethical debates have engaged institutions like Federal Communications Commission, Ofcom, European Court of Human Rights, and media watchdogs including Reporters Without Borders and Committee to Protect Journalists.
Notable case studies examine editorial alternation in coverage by The New York Times during the Watergate scandal, investigative series by The Washington Post on Pentagon Papers-era themes, longform alternation methods at ProPublica in reporting on Hurricane Katrina, and narrative shifts at The Guardian during the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers. Corporate examples include editorial calendars at Walt Disney Company properties, mergers involving News Corporation, and strategic shifts at Gawker Media and BuzzFeed, Inc..
Conceptual neighbors include agenda-setting theory developed from studies involving McCombs and Shaw, framing theory linked to research at Erving Goffman and Robert Entman, gatekeeping theory associated with Kurt Lewin and David Manning White, and models of editorial decision-making studied at Harvard Kennedy School and London School of Economics. Cross-disciplinary links involve analyses by scholars at Columbia University, Stanford University, University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Category:Journalism techniques